Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Liz Owen at Studio 2, Liverpool. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.
The mix of Liverpool’s Studio 2 and the summer heat is always akin to the feeling of intoxication, overwhelmed by the sound of music that comes out of the artists’ souls who frequent the stage. It can seem that all is missing from life at that moment is the smell of a barbeque lingering in the cloudless air, a beach ball being tapped around and small children running around and making the most of spending time in the company of adults by asking awkward questions or being enthralled by the lady with the guitar belting out the tunes as she sits on the patio.
These are the images of summer, an outdoor festival is O.K. but for some it is cumbersome, full of expectation and not enough planning, sometimes a half hearted performance or two thrown in and you can never truly see the performer’s face, can never get to understand their joy or their pain as you can when you are close up and personal in a venue which thrives on the feeling of togetherness.
It is a sensation; an emotion utilised and wonderfully shared by Liz Owen, a performer who for a while stayed out of the limelight of the Liverpool glare but who in the last few months has once again shone so bright, with so much luminous anger and beautiful sensitivity that an audience cannot help but be both impressed and thank themselves fortunate to watch her perform.
Every artist needs time away, a break in which to come back fighting so hard that they songs they bring to the table are positively so full of mood, of experience and of passion; it is a passion, an ark sized boat load of zeal and cracking enthusiasm that Liz Owen came to the stage at Studio 2 and with the thought of summer heat firmly in the minds of those in attendance, she gave arguably the most thrilling of displays of her voice.
A songwriter’s gift to joy lays in the mind of Liz Owen, all tempest and fire, the sense of love not abandoned and in the songs Pray, Maybe, Leave You Behind and Heroes, Ms. Owen truly captured the sense of furious and abiding vigour with inspired elegance.
To miss Liz Owen is to deny yourself a good night in the company of a wonderful singer songwriter, a charm of a personality and the raised eyebrow of enthused vocal animation; if she is playing near you soon, go and see for yourself, you will not regret it.
Ian D. Hall